


Dog Days of Summer

by hayesgeneration



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, College Student Stiles, Dogs, M/M, Vacation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-11
Updated: 2013-05-11
Packaged: 2017-12-08 05:28:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/757605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hayesgeneration/pseuds/hayesgeneration
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You're going on vacation with your family in two weeks, but despite your grown-ass age, you haven't yet found a sitter for your more-than-awesome dog. What do you do? Well, you seek out the vaguely familiar, hyperactive child of your parents' best friends. It's a simple plan with no holes in it - he's probably still as awkward as when he started high school anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm still not entirely sure where this is going, but I quite like what I have in my head so far! Now we just need it written down. See, I do write nice things; it's not all angst. This time, our plot bunny is a dog. I like dogs.  
> Rated with future chapters in mind - is that how people do it? Because this first chapter is pretty child-friendly, aside for the swearing. Oh well.

”You’re not seriously suggesting we bring a dog to Europe.”

Derek Hale is almost 30 years old, and he’s apparently still not over feeling like a remarkably dumb teenager whenever his mom gives him _the look_. In his defence, The Look works on Laura as well, and she’s even older than he is.

Not replying with anything but a grunt, Derek picks at his thumbnail and fidgets on the kitchen stool while his mom takes lasagne out of the oven.

“Derek, we’re leaving in less than two weeks – I thought you’d already found a dog sitter.”

Derek fights the urge to actually whine at her tone. His life is not fair. It’s absolutely not fair.

“I tried with Boyd and Erica, but they’re in Colorado, Isaac has the smallest apartment known to man, and uncle Peter, well, he didn’t actually have an excuse, but he can’t take Milo in either, so I’m sort of out of options.”

The dog in question zooms by the kitchen window in a blur, closely chased by Derek’s dad, who’s whooping like a ramped-up frat boy on a treasure hunt with a keg at the end. Mom snickers. Derek groans. If Milo hadn’t been such a big dog, it wouldn’t even have been a problem for Isaac to take him in; but a big Utonagan would most likely trash most of the little one-bedroom place in a matter of days, so alas, no dice. Besides, Isaac is _never_ home; if he’s not at his girlfriend’s, he’s at his boyfriend’s, and Derek is still trying to figure out how he’s making that work when _he_ can't even manage one of either. 

“Why don’t you try and find a day care or something, they probably do whole weeks as well,” mom starts as the front door opens and then closes, and Derek’s head snaps up, because the _atrocity_ of such a thought _—_

“But mom!” The special pitch Derek hits is strictly moms-only – and most likely only audible to dogs, ironically. He immediately shrinks when his mom juts out her hip, crosses her arms and lifts an eyebrow that says ‘please, Derek, you’re not five’ better than she could have ever voiced it verbally. The Hales have eyebrows famous several counties over.

“I just don’t like the idea of him being in a strange place for three weeks, alright? He’d be bored out of his skull,” Derek grumbles, just as his dad enters the kitchen.

“What are we arguing about?” he asks cheerily, as he loops an arm around his wife’s middle and reaches out to pick a mushroom out of the salad on the counter. Derek groans, because obviously, his life is hard.

“Derek hasn’t found a sitter for Milo yet,” his mom explains and leans into dad as he hums and noses at her cheek.

“Well obviously that’s a problem,” he says, and then just saunters off, because he’s of no god damn help. Derek is fairly convinced he needs new parents. Milo trots through the doorway and immediately makes a beeline for Derek’s stool.

“Actually, Talia,” dad pokes his head back into the kitchen. Derek is busy burying his fingers in the thick, timber grey scruff of Milo’s neck. The dog’s tongue lolls out of his mouth, and Derek shakes his handfuls of fur lightly. Californian summer is a killer this year; he must be so hot under all that hair. 

“I think the sheriff’s kid is home to watch the house while John’s in Washington – you think Stiles would mind watching Milo?” dad finishes, and Derek looks up as his mom hums thoughtfully.

“Well, he _did_ pester the poor man about getting a dog for the better part of eight years, I don’t see why college would change that,” she says, and picks up the salad to take into the dining room while howling up the stairs towards the guest room for Laura to get her butt downstairs.

Stiles. In all honesty, Derek mostly forgot about Stiles; the Beacon Hills sheriff’s kind of goofy-looking kid, equipped with a motor-mouth, a legendary love for plaid and an even more legendary knack for sticking his nose in things none of his business and getting into trouble as a result – something, Derek ponders, that’s probably a lot easier to get away with when you’re the sheriff’s son. Before she passed away, Stiles’ mom had been best friends with Derek’s mom, going way back to high school or something; Derek had just moved out when it happened, but being a Hale means being around family a lot, in the form of weekly dinners as a minimum, so he did get to witness Stiles and the sheriff spending _a lot_ of their time with the Hales for a while after.

There was something oddly natural about it, which  probably stemmed from the long friendship between their parents, so Derek didn’t really mind it when Stiles hung around him, shifting between boisterous and then quiet, like he suddenly remembered why he had been sad just fifteen minutes before.

He hasn’t seen Stiles in a while, though; he’s off to college somewhere Derek doesn’t remember, and Derek’s busy with work. And Milo. And work.  _Wow_ , he needs a hobby—

“ _Honey_ ,” his mom suddenly urges, right by his ear, and Derek starts on the spot.

“Where did you go?” she teases, and hands him placemats. Milo has been slobbering on his knee, just under the edge of his boardshorts. Derek makes a face.

“Just thinking,” he replies as he follows her into the dining room, descreetly brushing his knee against the table cloth to get rid of the dog drool.

“You think Stiles would be up for it?” he asks tentatively after a few moments. Mom nods immediately.

“I think he’d love to. You remember what he’s like around animals.”

Derek doesn’t, actually, and that makes him a little shamefaced. They’ve never really been _friends_ , but you’re sort of expected to be at least a little close to the children of your family friends; it’s sort of a given. Thing is, Stiles is younger than him by quite a few years, and it matters – or at least it did when they were younger, which Derek thinks is fair going. You can’t expect teenagers to be BFF’s with much younger children; it’s just not in the nature of broody, hormonal, sexually frustrated high schoolers. By god, Derek swears if time travel is invented in his life time, he’s going back to punch his younger self in the face, because that little sucker made it harder for himself than he’d had to, on so many accounts.

“I guess,” Derek says with a sigh. Milo pushes his big head into his thigh, and Derek sets down the placemats and drops into a squat. Milo stopped licking his face when he was three, at least when they’re around people he knows. If there are new people and new smells and he gets excited, that’s when the face licking happens; he’s a _very_ energetic dog, and Derek praises everything holy that he found a decently sized apartment just across from the park. Milo pushes his nose into the hollow of Derek’s throat and tries to wiggle and twist his whole body sideways into the cave made by Derek’s chest and knees, tail wagging heavily. So he thinks he’s a small puppy some days, Derek still thinks he’s smart as hell, no matter what Laura says.

“Whaddaya say, man, want the Stilinski boy to tire you the fuck out for when I come back?” Oh, Derek remembers Stiles’ high-powered energy supply; you don’t forget _that_. He drums both palms rapidly against Milo’s ribcage and shakes the canine body by its flanks. Milo barks with delight and squirms in Derek’s hold, and mom scolds Derek half-heartedly for getting the dog that excited indoors.

Derek doesn’t really care (neither does mom, probably); he’ll be gone for three weeks. He’s allowed to act like he’s Timmy and Milo is Lassie, because god damn it he loves his dog and three weeks is a long time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I advise that you Google "utonagan"; they're absolutely lovely dogs.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The heat wave sweeping over California is nearing 90 degrees, and while Stiles is pretty sure that the sensible thing to do would be to go lie down in the shade and just sweat for a while, he instead finds himself in his dad's garage, completely covered in dust.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter should have been written long ago, but I've been running around like a _nong_ trying to prepare myself for exams, which I am currently smack in the middle of.  
>  Have some Stiles - enjoy!

It’s Friday afternoon, the heat wave sweeping over California is nearing 90 degrees, and while Stiles is pretty sure that the sensible thing to do would be to go lie down in the shade and just sweat for a while, he instead finds himself in his dad's garage, completely covered in dust. There might be some spider corpses in there as well, and something had tickled briefly on the back of his neck moments before, but he doesn’t feel like dwelling on it.

“I’m sure it’s here somewhere,” Stiles mutters, half into the phone clutched between his shoulder and the side of his face, and half to himself.

“ _I thought you’d brought your Gamecube to college,_ ” says Scott on the other end, and bless him, Stiles thinks, because Stiles would have. Except—

“Except I didn’t have room for it when I brought my PS3 and my Nintendo 64 as well, I’m not exactly living in a mansion,” he says, and then spots something that – even through the layers of dust gathered between old cardboard boxes – looks very familiarly purple.

“Found it!” he exclaims, and wiggles the console out between a plastic tub filled with old wires and the remains of a lawnmower with a war cry.  

“Scott, my friend, victory is at hand. Now I just need to find the box of games and we’re set to stay safely inside when the town finally self-ignites.”

On the other end of the line, Scott huffs out a laugh.

“ _Is it seriously that hot?_ ”

Stiles glances down himself, shorts, sweaty Captain America shirt and all, and purses his lips.

“I’d say the Galapagos sounds like a skiing resort right now. Just wait until you land, you’ll see.” That’s probably an exaggeration, but Stiles never dealt well with extreme heat, and it _is_ hot, horrifyingly so, so he’s excused.

“ _So when’s our temporary dog coming over?_ ” Scott asks, apropos of nothing, unable to hide his enthusiasm. Stiles grins. Mrs. Hale had called his dad’s home phone the day before; apparently they need a dog sitter. Stiles isn’t sure whether he should be impressed or concerned that everybody seems to know he’s home (which they probably don’t, not _everybody_ , but the Hales are different). On the other hand, dog! Stiles likes dogs, as does Scott, obviously, because Scott’s studying to be a vet after having worked for the local one in Beacon Hills during most of high school. The Hales needing a dog sitter is an added bonus to Stiles’ upcoming home-holiday with his best friend and no sensible, _actual_ grown-ups around (because let’s face it, Stiles and Scott? Legal, yes. Grown-up when they’re together, not so much. Stiles isn’t bothered).

No wait, rewind, correction needed; _Derek_ , as in Derek Hale, needs a dog sitter. For his dog. Obviously. There are a good long list of other things Stiles would have sat – on or around, maybe even under if someone was feeling frisky – for Derek when Stiles was 16, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms he’s not about to bust out. He hasn’t seen Derek in years, anyway.

“In a few hours. Derek’s bringing him over,” Stiles replies as nonchalantly as possible. Trouble is, when you’ve known your best friend since you were in diapers, there are certain things that even the best fake nonchalance just can’t cover. So of course, Stiles hears the thick smirk in Scott’s voice when he drawls;

“ _Is Derek now?_ ”

Stiles groans. High school had been freakin’ hell, wrapped with a bow on top and put on his door step; the addition of a crush on a much older boy hadn’t helped much (there were good days, of course, and Scott, and a couple of shots at first line during his short-lived lacrosse-career, but mostly high school had been, well, high school).

From when Stiles had been little, Derek had always been this looming presence – not only because he tended to _actually_ loom, which had always been a bit creepy and intense, but also because his status in Stiles’ life never seemed to have gone from “exists in the periphery of your constant circle of acquaintances because your parents can’t get enough of these people” to an actual friendship. This meant a constant awareness of Derek’s presence in a way that Stiles didn’t know what to do with; he hadn’t known Derek well enough to feel entirely comfortable, but the years they’d known each other – since Stiles was born, pretty much – meant that Stiles couldn’t with good conscience feel _un_ comfortable either. And that had been weird.

“Yes, Scott, Derek is, and I’m absolutely thrilled. It’s like he’s coming home from war, I think I might swoon when he finally stands on my door step with his mutt,” Stiles snarks back, fishing out a shoebox with what ought to be GameCube discs.

“ _I’ll have my mom drop by and check on you, see if you’re still breathing after he’s left. See you tomorrow, man_ ,” Scott laughs, and hangs up.

He’s a dick. Stiles loves him to pieces.

 

-

 

When Derek _does,_ show up, an hour late, Stiles finds that you know what, that’s _perfectly_ okay, totally fine. Because Derek is looking just that; _fine_. Really fucking fine, if the t-shirt stretching across his torso like it’s literally suffering is any indication. Stiles has his hand on the open front door, and he can feel his brain tripping over itself, and then there’s a dog pushing its head into his stomach and it’s more than a welcome distraction, because Jesus ever-loving _Christ—_

“Derek, hi!”

Derek, true to old form, gives Stiles a tight smile. The dog – damn, it’s a big dog, is he a husky? – pants happily and presses tight against Stiles’ shins until Stiles actually starts petting him with equal gusto.

“So I guess Milo isn’t going to miss me _that_ much,” Derek says, almost sounding amused, following Stiles into the house with a fluent kind of habit that comes when you’ve been to someone’s home enough times. He unclips the leash from Milo’s collar, and the dog immediately starts sniffing around the hallway before padding into the living room and sticking his nose into the gap under a dresser.

“It’s good to see you,” Stiles says, because that’s totally the polite thing to do, and he’s not exactly lying. He can feel the distinct memory imprint of an old crush flaring somewhere behind his navel at Derek’s ‘you too’, and brushes it off. Derek _does_ look good, looks older (duh) and calmer. The last time Stiles had seen him, he had been going through a brutal break-up (at least according to Laura, with whom Stiles had somehow always connected better) and had looked… haggard. Stiles hadn’t asked, and Laura hadn’t told much, and that had been that. He wants to ask Derek what he does now, but then remembers that it’s probably embarrassing that he doesn’t already know.

“So what breed is he?” he asks instead, following in Milo’s trails into the kitchen, Derek following.

“Utonagan,” Derek replies, hand brushing briefly over his dog’s back as it passes him to get to Stiles. Stiles drops down on his haunches and catches Milo’s head in his hands just in time to avoid getting drool on his face.

“He’s great – aren’t you? Yes, you are, buddy, we are going to have a blast,” Stiles clucks, and Milo’s bushy tail wags with glee.

“Scott’s coming over for the summer, so he’ll have plenty of entertainment,” Stiles continues, patting down the dog’s heavy side.

“Who, Scott or Milo?”

Stiles blinks up at Derek, who’s leaning against the kitchen counter with half a crooked smile on his face.

“Ha, I almost forgot you make jokes sometimes. You didn’t outgrow it then,” Stiles says, and Derek snorts.

“That’s what you thought?”

Stiles shrugs.

“I had my reasons.”

Derek shakes his head and pushes off of the counter, sauntering around the kitchen with his arms across his chest. Stiles tracks his steps out of the corner of his eye, minutely aware of Derek’s calf muscles _right_ in his line of vision, while Milo whines as the petting ceases.

Stiles swears he sees the exact moment Derek’s expression softens, when his eyes land on a certain picture on the fridge door.

“Remember that one?” he pipes up from floor level, and Derek nods.

“Long Beach. My dad took a wrong turn in the first car and we got pretty lost on the way there.”

“How is your dad?” Stiles asks, and stands as Milo discovers a door he hasn’t seen before and trots through to the small downstairs bathroom.

“He’s good,” Derek replies. “Yours?”

“He’s fine. A little pissed about being “forced” on vacation,” Stiles does air quotes, “but you know how weird he’s always been with that sort of thing.” To that, Derek nods again, absentmindedly smoothing a finger over the edge of the photo. Stiles must have been around six at the time.

They’re quiet for a few long minutes, Derek’s eyes scanning the things on the fridge, like he’s looking for more familiar things from years back, Stiles for some reason still cross-legged on the floor until Milo returns and ungracefully deposits himself across his legs with a whuffle. Stiles gets his hands deep in the grey fur.

“He likes his kibble so don’t let him fool you; if he tries begging at the table, it’s because he thinks he’s smarter than you,” Derek says, eyeing the two on the floor.

“Well, is he?” Stiles jokes, and then scowls when Derek _actually considers it_.

“Whatever dude, you’re going on vacation without your dog, I’m the winner here either way,” he grins, and then promptly wants to take it back, because Derek’s face literally falls, right there, and melts into his default frown. Stiles recalls something about a stuffed toy, about Derek and attachment, Stiles with a bowl cut at the Hales’ one afternoon after pre-school. Derek had given Stiles his stuffed wolf to hold on to because Stiles had been sad, and he’d lost it. Derek always had a kinda weird way of dealing with getting close to things or people; he hadn’t even been mad at Stiles.

Derek drops down next to Stiles and rubs a slightly hairy hand over Milo’s belly. Stiles is intrigued.  

“Come on, man, it’ll be fine. I’ve never been to Europe – you guys will have to take some pictures, I want to see what all the hassle is about. Besides, when you get back he’ll have missed you so much he’ll cook you breakfast for a week after.”

What possesses him to bump his shoulder into Derek’s is a mystery to Stiles right from the 0.2 seconds after he actually does it. They never had this kind of familiarity growing up; sometimes Stiles would fall asleep with his head on Derek’s arm or something, and after his mom died he frequently found himself demanding hugs, mostly from Laura, but the occasional one from The Grumpy Hale as well. But _this_ —

Derek bumps him back, and Stiles might be completely non compos mentis at the moment, but that _could_ be a smile hiding in the guy’s permanent two-day stubble.

“Thanks,” Derek says, and Milo licks his hand. Stiles’ thigh is falling asleep under the weight.

“You’re very welcome. Now clue me in on what makes this big lug comply and what tickles his fancy, because otherwise I’ll be dancing to his tune from tomorrow on.”


End file.
